Comskip does not work on recorded TV (1 Viewer)

[Gregor07]

Thank you RonD,

TV Server was stopped (at least I could not see it in the Task-Manager).

When I test comskip in the ComSkip Launcher it works perfectly well.

I made another recording last night without success. I tried both options - recording start and recording end. No commercials found.

Attached are the logs.

 

[mm1352000]

According to your log files TV Server is definitely starting ComSkip:
[2015-09-06 15:50:18,641] [Log ] [scheduler thread] [INFO ] - ComSkipLauncher: Recording started (C:\Users\HTPC\Videos\Tanzparty mit dem Ehepaar Fern (1_19).ts on Einsfestival), launching program (C:\Program Files (x86)\Team MediaPortal\MediaPortal TV Server\Plugins\comskip\comskip.exe "C:\Users\HTPC\Videos\Tanzparty mit dem Ehepaar Fern (1_19).ts") ...

[2015-09-06 20:09:25,688] [Log ] [scheduler thread] [INFO ] - ComSkipLauncher: Recording started (C:\Users\HTPC\Videos\Pain & Gain.ts on ProSieben), launching program (C:\Program Files (x86)\Team MediaPortal\MediaPortal TV Server\Plugins\comskip\comskip.exe "C:\Users\HTPC\Videos\Pain & Gain.ts") ...

For "Pain & Gain", ComSkip only processed 34 frames:

Parsed 34 video frames and 16 audio frames at 212.50 fps

Maybe ComSkip was able to process faster than "real time", and so thought it had finished... but the recording had only just started.
Another possibility is that the recording is incomplete due to inadequate signal strength/quality.

Did you check that the recording is viewable and does not contain corruption (pixelation, audio beeps/splutters etc.)?

 

[HTPCSourcer]

@Gregor07

Maybe ComSkip was able to process faster than "real time", and so thought it had finished...

Try changing the setup so that Comskip starts after the recording is finished.

 

[Skywizard]

That seems to be the secret - I changed to after the recording finished and I now see the "chapters" on the two shows I checked one of which is an HD channel.

Given the after recording finishes works, why is there an option to start comskip when recording starts?

 

[HTPCSourcer]

Hy Skywizard,

The solution was posted by me, not mm (check your citation...).

Given the after recording finishes works, why is there an option to start comskip when recording starts?

You are looking at 10 year old MP developments - PCs were not always as fast as today.[/QUOTE]

 

[mm1352000]

...and some people want to be able to start watching their recordings (and skip ads) before they've completed.

 

[HTPCSourcer]

Theoretically Comskip will read an ongoing recording until the end of file, then wait some time and test if the file has grown.

While this used to work in the past, user reports in this thread indicate some issues here, which are nonetheless due to Comskip and not MediaPortal. Depending on how Comskip determines the recording file size, there may be a lag between what is kept in buffer and what is physically written to the disc, therefore the waiting time might not be long enough and Comskip terminates without continuing its processing. I don't know if there is any parameter in the ini section that allows this waiting time to be increased, but it might be worth checking for this possibility.

 

[gonzo90017]

Don't know if this is of any help. But when I reinstalled Mediaportal version 1.9 along with Comskip Monitored I couldn't get the latest version of comskip working either (didn't try the "After recording finishes trick"). I decided to revert back to an older version (comskip 0.81.069) and it's working fine now.

 

[Gregor07]

According to your log files TV Server is definitely starting ComSkip:
[2015-09-06 15:50:18,641] [Log ] [scheduler thread] [INFO ] - ComSkipLauncher: Recording started (C:\Users\HTPC\Videos\Tanzparty mit dem Ehepaar Fern (1_19).ts on Einsfestival), launching program (C:\Program Files (x86)\Team MediaPortal\MediaPortal TV Server\Plugins\comskip\comskip.exe "C:\Users\HTPC\Videos\Tanzparty mit dem Ehepaar Fern (1_19).ts") ...

[2015-09-06 20:09:25,688] [Log ] [scheduler thread] [INFO ] - ComSkipLauncher: Recording started (C:\Users\HTPC\Videos\Pain & Gain.ts on ProSieben), launching program (C:\Program Files (x86)\Team MediaPortal\MediaPortal TV Server\Plugins\comskip\comskip.exe "C:\Users\HTPC\Videos\Pain & Gain.ts") ...

For "Pain & Gain", ComSkip only processed 34 frames:

Parsed 34 video frames and 16 audio frames at 212.50 fps

Maybe ComSkip was able to process faster than "real time", and so thought it had finished... but the recording had only just started.
Another possibility is that the recording is incomplete due to inadequate signal strength/quality.

Did you check that the recording is viewable and does not contain corruption (pixelation, audio beeps/splutters etc.)?

The recording is viewable and does not contain corruption. No commercials were found by comskip. My setting for comskip was "recording end". I will try version 0.81.069 and give you an update. But this will take some days.

 

[SJG]

New user of MP, less than a month. Love it so far. I too am having these same problems with processing live recordings for commercials and noticed all the posts between Aug 20 and Sept 11. Looked at the download page for comskip to download 0.81.069 and noticed the newest version 0.81.088 has a date of Sept 12. The most exciting thing is that the release history says:

Changes on 0.81.088
- Bug solved: Sometimes aborts during live processing because it can not open codec
- Bug solved: hardware_decode=1 does not make any difference
- Bug solved: Sometimes Comskip never finishes or crashes while processing a recording​

I'm hopeful that the first item (which I bolded/underlined) addresses the problems we've been having. I'll check tonight during a scheduled recording and let you know whether 0.81.088 works as well as 0.81.069 to handle commercials during a live recording.